Hero Worship
by laudanine
Summary: Hero-worship, but just a minor case. A brief oneshot, sometime shortly post-Avengers. It's true Stark comes off as a jerk, but if he changed it would seem so disingenuous. Sort of Steve/Tony? If you squint.


"Well, as always it's been fun, but I have to fly."

"I hope you're not serious."

"What, about flying? Are you kidding, no way; I'm drunk. Jesus, Rhodey, I got over my insanely suicidal phase last year. You're a terrible friend, can't you even remember if I've decided to be responsible this year or not? This is why we don't hang out." Stark rose, gulping down the last of his drink.

"Pardon me for my shoddy memory, maybe it has something to do with that time we tried to bash one-another's heads in. While you were drunk. It's fine if you can't recall." The seated man didn't rise to see his friend out. "Happy here? Did you text him while I wasn't looking?"

"No, and no he's probably a few blocks out yet. I let JARVIS manage my timing for the evening: it's easier to be drunk when someone else reminds you where and when you have to be. Not that you'd understand, I'm sure, Mr. Punctual."

Rhodes raised an eyebrow, "Where are you headed?"

"Home! Well, the tower. Stark Tower, Avengers Tower? Not sure on the name, still yet." Tony leaned one-armed on the table, and Rhodes simply raised one eyebrow in a request for more information. "Clint, Barton, is cooking. A welcome-home dinner for Natasha. We weren't sure if she be back in the States tonight or not, so I told JARVIS to get Happy to get ME before Barton's dinner if she was. I may be drunk, but that seems complicated. Is that complicated?"

Rhodes ignored the tangent, "So you're making sure to attend a welcome-home dinner for the only woman you know other then Pepper. I should have known, somehow, that there was a girl to impress. Or harass. She's not working for you anymore, is she Tony? Aren't there laws to keep you, well, keep you away? Just away in general."

"No, Mr. Punctual-and-Politically-Correct," Stark was now half-sitting on the booth's table, head twisted at an awkward angle to talk over one shoulder. "Again: Jesus. She doesn't work for me, and would kick my ass if I bothered her. Happily, in fact, very happily. I am not going for her."

"The archer?" Rhodes raised an eyebrow. "The archer who looks as thought his face had been struck repeatedly by a frying-pan?"

"Rhodey, I have taste! God. No. I just don't want to miss a team dinner," Tony snatched up the glass Rhodes had been slowly pacing himself through. "Everyone else will be there. It's good for team moral. Or something very rational sounding and responsible like that. Clearly."

"You are not a paradigm of rationality or responsibility. The food must be good."

"No, I swear Clint's cooking boils down to 'Open MRE, stir about, spill onto plate.' Pitiful. Which is funny, 'cause Nat's cooking is amazing, like, gourmet or something obscene."

"Nat?"

"Yes. I can have nicknames for them, we are a team. We are the team," Tony finished Rhodes' glass as well. "I don't go for the food, or to harass ex-employees."

"You go for the 'team morale.'"

"Yes."

"Right."

"Right," Stark's pocket buzzed. "Well, Happy is here."

"Or the world is ending."

"It yells 'Avengers Assemble' when that happens." Stark sauntered vaguely toward the door, with minimal interception by tables or chairs.

"Tell me your kidding!" Rhodes shook off his momentary shock to call out after Stark from the back of the bar, but it was too late and Tony simply raised a hand in farewell as he left while answering his phone.

"My god, yes Cap, I heard you; I'll make it to the damn dinner!"

* * *

"This tastes like roadkill. It this roadkill, Barton? I know she was in some god-awful third world country for three months, but you don't have to make her feel at home. You could have served ramen. Or even take-out Chinese food, I would have been okay with that."

"Tony," the archer glared, poking food around his plate without actually ingesting any of it. "Screw you."

"No listen, Nat; what do you think, would you have preferred a nice plate of peeking-pork or whatever the heck this used to be."

"The sauce is a bit like tikka masala," Banner smiled, still balancing the second forkful in one hand and smoothing the table-cloth with his other. Next to him Thor shoveled a third serving down with a noncommittal shrug.

"Well, I like it," Captain America proclaimed, much to the dismay and eye-rolling of the still-rather-drunk man next to him. "I think it's different, sort of like stir-fry. And it means Natasha's home safe, which is what really matters."

"Captain, you have the most bizarre palate known to man. Can I get you to come to the lab and let us run tests on you? What do you say, Bruce, think the super-soldier serum might have driven him totally mad, or just coated his mouth in steel? We can make him eat things and see if he vomits."

Across the table Banner shook his head with a, "No Tony," and thus began a jovial, and at least twenty minute long, argument as to whether or not Rogers and Banner were both "freaks and obviously genetically altered to have poor taste," much to the amusement of all parties.

"God," Barton ducked his head and half-whispered after watching Natasha eat a few mouthfuls without comment on the taste, "Stark is such an asshole."

Natasha paused, looking at the Rogers sticking his tongue out and laughing at the vaguely-reeling scientist next to him, "Is he?"


End file.
